Miss Darcy
by Pemberley Postponed
Summary: Following the trials and triumphs of the spirited Miss Isabella Darcy. Written (or attempted) in the style of the time. ..."I know what has happened!" cried Miss Rose Bingley eagerly – and despite her cousin frowning at her, and making other peculiar faces expressive of dissuasion, it did not prevent the young lady from declaring: "There is a handsome gentleman arrived!"...
1. Chapter 1

_A/N Hello, dear Readers! This story takes place around **two decades** after the events so famously penned by the fair hand of Jane Austen. It centers around the trials and triumphs of the only child of Mr and Mrs Darcy, **Miss Isabella Darcy,** as well as her cousins **Mary and Arthur Earl,** the orphaned offspring of Darcy's sister Georgiana.  
I have tried to be as true to Austen's style of prose as I can manage, within my limited capabilities. Because the writing is quite detailed and dense, I have made the chapters fairly short, around 1000 - 1500 words each.  
_ _A quick word on spelling - at times I have used the old-fashioned spelling of certain words, for e.g "ancles", "snewed," and "sate" (rather than ankles, snowed and sat). I have been a little arbitrary with these, and may end up changing them back if it starts to feel like it's distracting from the narrative. Let me know your thoughts or preferences, if you have any._

 _I adore Jane Austen and mean no disrespect in daring to pick up where she left off.  
I hope you enjoy it! If you do... please review! (Concrit is welcome but please try to keep it kind.)  
Copyright 2015_

* * *

I.

 _In which the heroine of the narrative is introduced to the Reader. The orphaned children of Georgiana Darcy are taken in by Mr and Mrs Darcy.  
_ _Fate, having united the three as children, divides them as adults._

...

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a married couple, happily united, must be in want of at least eight or nine children."

If ever there existed dissenters to the maxim, Mr and Mrs Darcy of Pemberley were not to be counted among them. But Truth, such as it is, does not always reckon with Fate, and it was not long before the young couple discovered that – subsequent to the difficult birth of their first child, a daughter – they were not to bring forth any more offspring into the world, without incurring the probable penalty of taking the mother directly out of it.

Mr Darcy was not so attached to his family's ancient name as to sacrifice his heart upon its altar: and so it was necessarily decided that one, single, dark-haired Miss must do as well as any number of such little Masters – and that was to be the end of it.

But in this regard Fate had not quite done with the Darcys.

Ere five years had passed, a succession of tragic events brought Mr Darcy's beloved sister Georgiana to an early grave – and within twelve months her broken-hearted husband Mr Earl followed her thither. Their two orphaned children, barely out of swaddling, were brought to Pemberley, where they were received with such care and love, that seldom was the fact of their once having had a different set of parents either remembered or lamented.

That they would have received every kindness had they been tiresome, quarrelsome children, was indubitable: but the Darcys were spared the trouble of proving their unconditional affection, for Arthur and Mary Earl were not difficult to love. Both resembled their mother in temper (which had been serene) and their father in looks (which had been fair). In these they were at variance to their adoptive sister, Isabella, a person of somewhat mercurial temper, chiefly manifest through the varying expressions of a pair of bold, dark eyes. However, _that_ young lady being also the owner of a good measure of wit and a great deal of liveliness, nobody could long sustain a real grievance against her proclivity to waywardness, least of all her doting parents.

Little more than a year separated the respective ages of the three children, and they grew up as close and cordial as any siblings might, and much closer than many do.

Isabella, the instigator of a great diversity of action and adventure, found in Mary a willing adherent, and in Arthur a more supervisory participant, for within the boy's nature was a finely-wrought sense of safety and propriety – further augmented by an innate ability to advise without offending – so that he was able to regulate some of his cousin's wilder schemes and tailor them to suit both the gentler disposition of his sister, as well as his own more serious one.

Happy were these childhood years, passed beneath Pemberley's graceful roof.

Mr and Mrs Darcy led by example that wherever mutual respect and harmony dwelt within a household, there too must exist contentment and happiness. The high spirits and ready wit of the wife balanced perfectly with the honourable sincerity of the husband, who (as it very often transpires) proved to be the more indulgent parent: so that in the end it was Mrs Darcy who ruled in matters of discipline and justice, albeit with a dry humour in place of the usual iron fist.

Childhood is always fleeting when viewed from a parental perspective, and indeed it seemed to the Darcys their family had but yesterday been in its infancy, when suddenly and unanimously they emerged as full-grown persons of six-and-seven teen. – And no sooner was adulthood achieved then change was to follow swiftly thereafter.

This change appeared in the shape of two persons.

The first was a respectable man by the name of Barnet, a friend and near relation of old Mr Earl, who came to fetch the son back to his late father's estate, to teach him the running of it in preparation of his becoming it's inheritor two years hence.

The second person was Mr Darcy's here-to-fore estranged aunt, a lady of indomitable force of character, undiminished by her extremely advanced accumulation of years. – Lady Catherine, overtaken by a sudden fit of magnanimity, came to claim her great-niece for the purpose of undertaking her "finishing" – without which, she patently implied, the girl would scarce be presentable in any society elevated beyond that of basic savagery.

If motives of repentance and reconciliation were at first looked for to explain this unexpected turn of events, they were soon enough disproved by the unconcealed hostility of the elderly lady unto the present Mrs Darcy, who observed it with no surprise, some exasperation, and much amusement. "I do believe," she confided her husband on the subject, "that Lady Catherine wishes to frighten away every trace of my influence upon Mary, before it quite sets."

Whatever the impetus behind the offer, it was not such a one to be refused, being perhaps the first step to repairing the long-standing rift between the two great houses of Pemberley and Rosings. Moreover, the Darcys were forced to acknowledge that Lady de Bourgh could do much to secure their niece's future. The proximity of Kent to London, the comparative isolation of Pemberley from "society", and Lady Catherine's unmatched inventory of court connections – these all weighed much in Rosing's favour.

This kindness was utterly lost on Mary Earl, who was loath to leave the home that had afforded her so many years of tranquility and happiness, but she pleaded her case in vain: to the grand seat of her great-aunt and new benefactress she would go directly.

Isabella Darcy, observing the real distress of her cousin, was forced to conceal her own depression of spirits at the imminent loss of the playmates of her youth, with brave words and a brave face – and so far did her cheerful encouragement go to calm and reassure Mary, that at length the young lady was able to face her removal with some measure of composure and even excitement.

And so the three cousins parted, and many a tear was shed, and many a pang was felt.

For the first time in her life Isabella Darcy was forced to perceive what had thus far been always obscured to her: that she really was an "only" child.


	2. Chapter 2

_..._

 _In which Arthur Earl regrets the loss of his sister and adopted family.  
_ _Mary Earl feels her consequence, and is the object of gossip which, though vulgar, is not wholly unwelcome._

 _..._

Time is not the regular, unvarying constant it is purported to be. Four years, which may seemingly linger as a small eternity to some, will to others pass with astonishing rapidity. This peculiar anomaly was to be felt keenly by the separated Earl siblings.

To Arthur, time seemed to grind to a near standstill, for the elderly Mr Barnet proved a poor substitute for his lively, scheming cousin Isabella, his tutors and companions were no match for his dear sister, beloved aunt and admired uncle; while the creaking Gothic gloom of his family's seat Dunwood made a sorry contrast to the bright, spacious elegance of beautiful Pemberley.

Yet for his sister Mary Earl the time fairly rushed by. Lady Catherine, whilst by no means a kindly nor very scintillating chaperone, proved however a very attentive and distinguished one. Rarely a week passed without a ball to attend, an acquaintance to call on, or an expedition to undertake: they were received with deference and treated with distinction wherever they went.

Once her initial shyness and trepidation faded Mary's pliant disposition enabled her to submit to her great-aunt's dominance and demands with unaffected good-nature: she was amiable enough for the both of them. At length she began to enjoy her position as a young lady of real consequence – not that she had been considered otherwise _before_ , but now, surrounded by such solemn stateliness and grand company, and without her cousin and aunt to ridicule it, she really _felt_ it. Had Mary possessed one whit less her natural sweetness of temper she might have been in danger of becoming proud or haughty: but this she never could, for she was too much disposed to please and be pleased with everybody she met, despite Lady Catherine's frequent directives to the contrary.

Another circumstance served to imbue Mary's position with special piquancy. Lady Catherine had no heir. Her only issue, a frail girl called Anne, had succumbed to one of the many illnesses that had troubled her existence, some several years earlier. Lady Catherine's inheritance would naturally have devolved upon Mr Darcy, but from that prospect he had positively disqualified himself twenty years prior, by preferring to marry the present Mrs Darcy above his sickly cousin, against the express wishes of his aunt.

Another nephew, Colonel Fitzwilliam, was soon established to be the fitting successor. But (alas for Lady Catherine and her ill-used daughter!) this nephew proved as inconstant as the last one. – Some unfathomable freak in his nature attracted him to the daughter of a wealthy Baron, whereby he willingly passed up the opportunity of having a rich but plain and feeble wife, in favour of an even richer, beautiful, lively one.

Anne's decline and death effectively prevented any more cousins from jilting her. The great estate of Rosings was to pass to a more distant relation, one Mr Alwyn Delaney, but there was no reason to suppose the vast wealth of the mother would go exclusively in the same direction.

Mary Earl's own mother, Georgiana Darcy, had, during her own short life, been a favourite of Lady Catherine. Her shyness and awe, which had rendered her pretty well speechless before her imperious aunt, had also served to secure that lady's high regard, for a person who values their own opinion above all others' is very naturally attracted to those too terrified to ever oppose it.

Common gossip (which we are told to discredit, but tend rather to believe when it contains something advantageous to ourselves) circulated a most happy theory: namely that Miss Mary Earl was to be her great-aunt's heiress of some fifty thousand pounds!

A worthy coup indeed for common gossip! – To infiltrate the politest drawing rooms in the land, where we know only theology, philosophy, politics and art are ever voluntarily discussed! It is quite a mystery how idle conjecture ever insinuates itself thither: one can only suppose some kind of mistake occurs, whereby the sensitive ears belonging to the finest personages are accidentally and unwillingly pervaded by such.

However it exactly occurred, Mary Earl discovered that she was considered practically an heiress already. That her great-aunt still lived, that her cousin Delaney was by no means estranged, that there were other relatives with equally as compelling a claim on Lady Catherine's remembrances – all this was nothing, according to popular opinion. Mary Earl was the happy fortunate.

When first she heard of it, Mary was incredulous. At length, she became merely doubtful. Finally, she believed.

The one person who might have set the matter completely to rest, Lady Catherine herself, seemed to be the single person in all of Kent who had _not_ heard the report, and who was coincidentally the only person to whom none of the theorists applied for its verification. (It is the habit of gossipers never to seek out the truth of a rumour, if it be at all likely to ruin the charm of the fable). _Had_ she known... ( – But that too is idle conjecture. It is enough to say, there is a little fact in every fiction, a little lie in every truth.)

These rather remarkable developments Mary never mentioned to her cousin Isabella, either in her letters (which were in all other points very comprehensive and candid), nor in person, on the tolerably regular visits she made to her old home. This uncharacteristic reticence was not the product of a lingering doubt within her own breast, but a reluctance to discern it in another's. – In short, she wished not to be dissuaded from believing.

Miss Darcy noticed only that her cousin was in better spirits than she had formerly reckoned to hope for; that from year to year Mary grew handsomer and more confident; and that she retained her sweet, amiable temper. She heard with pleasure the details of this elegant ball or that impressive banquet; she listened to the minutiae concerning the visit of a famous politician who dined at Rosings and paid Mary a very handsome compliment; she eagerly discussed the particulars of a certain ball where a dashing young count asked Mary twice to dance; she shared in her happiness and begrudged her not a whit of it.

Isabella loved her own home too well to aspire to exchange it for the remote grandeur of Rosings, moreover she had not Mary's serene disposition – she was perfectly convinced that she would chafe under Lady Catherine's despotic nature. As for such fashionable balls and refined society: she was quite content with her native Derbyshire's own not inconsiderable share.


	3. Chapter 3

_..._

 _In which Isabella's friend Miss Annie Yarrow makes her first appearance. The ladies contemplate the manifold virtues of Arthur Earl._

 _..._

It sometimes occurs, between two persons quite different in manner, character, and position, that there exists a close and real affection, a natural concurrence of sympathies and taste, of ideas and feelings.

Such was soon the case with Miss Darcy of Pemberley and Miss Yarrow of Lambton.

The young ladies might never have discovered one another had not they each been suffering similar deficits of companionship – Isabella by the loss of her dear cousins, and Annie (for such was Miss Yarrow's name) by the departure of her sister, lately married and gone off to that impossibly remote and barbaric reach of the world, Ireland.

Accident or fortune threw them into company on several occasions: politeness soon gave way to cordiality, which in turn submitted to a real regard and, at length, intimacy.

They could scarce be more dissimilar in looks and disposition. The fine, bold Miss Darcy, rather dashing and always merry, seemed all at odds with the retiring, slight-built Miss Yarrow, whose mild expression and soft voice inspired people to prefix her name with all manner of fragile adjectives. But despite some less than generous observations made by certain parties on the matter, the attachment was based neither on pity by the one, nor gratitude by the other. Nay, it was a true and equal friendship, of mutual respect, shared interests and a compatible sense of humour, which is to say – the best kind. If fault there was to find in the attachment it could only be in the propensity for the two young ladies to rather jealously 'keep' to each other, to the exclusion and perhaps chagrin of other sensitive females in the neighbourhood.

Miss Yarrow was the daughter of Lambton's doctor, Mr John Yarrow, a man highly respected and even celebrated in his professional calling. Though of humble beginnings, Mr Yarrow had been, through the kindly intervention of a rich relation, the beneficiary of an excellent education – in Edinburgh he learnt his craft, and there he also established his reputation and modest financial gain. His luck was further extended by his capturing the heart of a gentleman's daughter, a sensible Scottish lady who refused to conform to the usual practise of judging a man's worth solely by his parentage, though it remains ever so fashionable a one.

The couple were wed. To Derbyshire did John and Margaret Yarrow presently repair, at the behest of Lambton's foremost patrons, upon the retirement of the township's only medical man.

Fortune, which had been used to smiling on Mr Yarrow, continued in its partiality, and showered him with all the blessings of a happy family and a successful career: and since he was as widely respected for his good work as he was liked for his amiable nature, soon Mr Yarrow and his family were counted among the first personages in the vicinity. His daughters, like their parents, grew up sensible and kind, though not robust, and as Annie was quite pretty enough to be generally talked of as "sweet-faced", she really had as little to complain about as any young lady not yet one-and-twenty.

Miss Darcy regularly expressed wonder at their never having managed to "fall in" with one another before, and eagerly lamented her friend's absence from her own childhood, for she was certain that Miss Yarrow as a girl would have been an invaluable addition to her little circle of playfellows.

"Nay, Isabella," Miss Yarrow reproached her, when the subject was revived on one such occasion, "I'm sure that with two such excellent companions to share your childhood you could hardly then have imagined an extra one, let alone wished for it."

"But hindsight prevails on me to imagine it now," said Miss Darcy "and to regret it, heartily."

"I am sure you wrong your cousins by admitting it."

"Not so: for I speak of particulars, not generalities," replied the young lady. "Certain exploits would have profited immeasurably from a fourth party. – There was an incident with a rowing boat. – (However, perhaps that was doomed to failure, for it was riddled with holes.) – But I can think of five – nay, at least six instances, in which an additional member to our party would have advantageously impacted the outcome of an adventure."

This speech was met with the amused smile it had meant to inspire. "I am obliged, to be sure," said Miss Yarrow, "– however, I doubt you could have persuaded me to participate in that sort of adventure."

"Oh, do you say so! Yet I see not that you could have rightly objected, if my cousin Arthur did not. _His_ judgement no one can fault, although I can hardly thank you for questioning mine."

"I must pain you farther, then, by avowing that I _do_ question the judgement of him whom you call faultless."

Miss Darcy looked shocked. "After all I have told you of his virtues and excellences?"

"There is my difficulty – I have only _your_ sketches with which to make out a likeness. Until I behold the original, it is your shading and tinting, upon which I must rely."

"And that you do not, I suppose! – Once more, I reserve my thanks."

"I am newly compelled to mistrust your performance," Miss Yarrow admitted calmly.

"Why, pray?"

"Because you mentioned that your cousin Arthur was somehow involved with this infamous boating scheme, and I cannot see what business a young boy has with a leaking boat, let alone in the company of two girls."

"And is this really all?" cried Isabella. "Over one trifling incident, long buried in the mists of ancient history, you are prepared to launch an attack, not only on my own want of propriety, but also my cousin Arthur's! – Yet I am in a strong position to mount a defence; perhaps, even, force a retreat."

"I am at your service."

"Then I shall begin! – You will scarce believe this, Annie, but at the tender age of twelve I was quite a wild, boyish kind of creature. – You look wholly unsurprised. – (For a third time, I must thank you not.) – I know it is hard to credit, but I liked my own way very well, and was difficult to control once my mind was settled on a thing." Here she paused, to give her friend the opportunity to refute that possibility – but, met with silence, she soon resumed her tale. "On one occasion my cousins and I wandered pretty far: we discovered a small but deep lake, and on its bank an old worn-out rowing boat. Can you guess what happened next, Annie?"

Miss Yarrow nodded. "You persuaded your cousins to row with you out on the lake."

"Here is your first mistake!" declared Isabella triumphantly. "My cousins would by no means consent: rather, they did all in their power to dissuade me from attempting it."

"Then they were wiser than you."

"Aye, certainly, and still are," said Miss Darcy blithely. "However – I was not to be dissuaded. My cousin Mary ran back to our house to raise the alarm: she was certain I would be drowned directly. For the same reason, Arthur would _not_ leave me. At length he proposed a compromise – he would try out the boat first, and if it proved sea-worthy he would row me about in it. – The long and short of it is, the boat was _not_ sea-worthy, and my cousin Arthur was very nearly drowned in my stead. Now, is this not proof enough of his gallantry, if not his faultlessness?"

Miss Yarrow was prepared to concede that, at least, he sounded like a sensible person.

"Aye, that will do!" laughed Miss Darcy. "I have been told that, coming from another sensible person, there is no higher praise."

Miss Yarrow submitted to her friend's teasing with good grace. She really had heard (and believed) enough on the virtues of her friend's two absent cousins to like them both very well on account; furthermore, she was at that particular age, between nineteen and twenty, that predisposed her to admire chivalry in any young man, so it would have been strange indeed had she not fallen a little in love, on principle, with the endlessly extolled Arthur Earl.


	4. Chapter 4

_..._

 _In which the Bingley family visit the Darcys, a ball is proposed, and a picnic planned. Mr Lucas Bingley and his brother Henry are introduced.  
_ _Sprained ancles are very much feared by two young ladies._

 _..._

Pemberley was to have a ball! A happy miscellany of aunts, uncles, and cousins visiting the Derbyshire area was to ultimately conclude in their convergence under the Darcys' roof. – Mr and Mrs Bingley and their four children were already stopping there; two more of Mrs Darcy's sisters were even now on their way, each with a respective daughter in tow; Mary had arrived at the beginning of the week, and Arthur expected by its end.

With so many young persons gathered together, it seemed only right to contrive something for their amusement: a ball for the following week was proposed and received with enthusiasm by all, and with extra passion by the females of the party.

Invitations were sent out to the respectable families in and around Lambton and Kympton, which proved so universally popular that the personages delighted to accept swelled to above five and thirty.

Miss Darcy was especially glad. At last, to have all her dearest friends assembled under her very own roof! To be able to introduce Miss Yarrow to Arthur and Mary! To add these contemplated gratifications to the pleasures already brought with the arrival of her dear cousins the Bingleys, and their parents (the best of all her aunts and uncles) –! It seemed to Isabella to be an excess of accumulated happinesses.

The elder Bingley brothers were great favourites of hers.

Mr Lucas Bingley, the first born, was a generous and hearty young man, always in excellent spirits, vigorous in all he did, and disposed to do almost anything. When it was fine, he ambled, he strolled, he rode and he hunted. When it rained, he played cards, or billiards, he read, and he talked. He danced energetically and well, and his admiration of music and art was general but sincere. With children he was conspiratorial, with ladies he was courteous, to the old and infirm he was patient and kind. Miss Darcy, herself an eager, energetic person, had always esteemed him: as the years passed, she thought there could not be a more well-disposed young man to be found in all of England.

Although his younger brother, Mr Henry Bingley, was _not_ eager or energetic, Miss Darcy prized him no less highly. He had a quietly expressed wit and a fine appreciation of the absurdities of human nature, which recommended him highly to the daughter of Mrs Elizabeth Darcy. It was said by those who had known their mutual grandfather, Mr Bennet, that the cousins had each inherited something of his nature; and family legend had it that the old gentleman, though he did not survive to see them gain adulthood, once said of Isabella and Henry that "he harboured high hopes of their one day carrying on his life's work: illuminating mankind's great tendency to silliness."

The two younger Bingley children were sincere, pretty girls of ten and eleven, who adored their cousin Isabella, and devoted many hours of study to replicating her mode of dress, arrangement of hair, and general manner of bearing and carriage – although they stopped short of mimicking her rather saucy style of speech: something they rather beheld with amazement and wonder, and occasionally even terror. (For _that_ part of their informal education they looked to Mary Earl, who proved a much safer model than Isabella in ways of conversation and opinion, and whose pliant disposition must recommend her as much to children as it did to all else who knew her.)

Both Briony and Rose Bingley secretly wished their two beautiful cousins might one day condescend to marry Lucas and Henry, and be accordingly claimed for Hertfordshire – however this they held out not much hope for, having extensively read certain novels which consigned all handsome, rich young ladies to a destiny fraught with foreign princes and raven-haired counts &c.

Such agreeable company and such clement weather were gifts not to be squandered indoors. The days flew by in a flurry of lakeside walks, hilltop clambers and pilgrimages to medieval ruins.

With the arrival of Isabella's aunts Mrs Kitty Park and Mrs Mary Gourd, and their respective daughters Daphne and Celia, the party became divided. – The elder ladies had not much taste for "the wilderness" (an epithet serving for any outdoor place less cultivated than a shrubbery) and the younger ones preferred to display their not inconsiderable accomplishments – one of great stylishness, and the other of extreme decorum – against the more favourably sedate backdrop of the drawing room.

Etiquette demanded Pemberley's master and mistress attend to all their guests' inclinations: Mr and Mrs Darcy must now remain at home with these new arrivals, while Mr and Mrs Bingley would preside over the activities of the more adventurous youngsters.

Isabella regretted that her parents must forgo the exhilaration of outdoor pursuits, no doubt in exchange for conversation limited to the most ordinary stock of pleasantries – but she could not help being a little gleeful of her own freedom, and the influence and consequence it added to her position amongst her comrades.

Immediately she formed a new scheme for her party's amusement – involving enough peril to preclude the possibility of the other faction being persuaded to overcome their reservations and join them – and quickly recruited her cousins Mary, Rose and Briony to support and urge her case to the gentlemen, and once that was gained, to their parents.

There was an old, abandoned Folly situated atop a cliff not five miles west of Lambton, on lands now given over to grazing cattle, which, Miss Darcy declared, to not visit it, would be very much equivalent to their collective committing of a crime.

"To be sure, it will be a steep drive, and the path must undoubtedly be overgrown with thistles," she admitted, "but a little hardship must make the reward only sweeter. – The Folly itself is picturesque enough to deserve the exertion – but think on the view! We must walk at least an hour along the cliff-top to do it justice. Mary, you might bring your sketchbook and record something of it for posterity."

Mary Earl replied, "Certainly. – But, Isabella, dear, are you sure the drive is not too dangerous a one? What if we were to lose a wheel, or to turn over?"

The Bingley girls clutched hands and trembled at the thought.

"Nay, nay, you know that sort of accident is usually attributed to driving at excessive speed, and therefore only likely to occur on flat, straight roads," said Isabella, who did not exactly know it herself, but felt there was enough logic behind her theory to present it as fact. "And I dare say we have valiant men enough among us to cope with any small mishap along the way."

"But suppose one of us were to sprain an ancle? It would be a shame to miss the pleasure of dancing at the ball next week."

At this, Rose and Briony went positively white. A more disastrous outcome could scarce be imagined, not quite excluding the breaking of one's neck.

But Miss Darcy would have none of it. "Bah! We are only to wend along the cliff-top, not scramble down its face! A lady capable of spraining her ancle there must be capable of doing so in her own garden: it would be the consequence of her own clumsiness, and therefore, wholly deserved."

"I suppose that may be true," said Miss Earl, somewhat doubtfully.

Isabella relented a little. "Well – if a lady feared very much for her ancles, she might stay by the Folly and admire the view, in the shelter of its portico. It would scarcely be a punishment to wait there while the rest of the party rambled."

Mary looked relieved. "You are quite right," said she, with a smile.

Isabella turned her sparkling dark eyes toward her two young cousins. "Let us find your brothers, girls, and recommend our scheme to them. Perhaps we may go tomorrow!"

As Miss Earl offered no further objections, the Miss Bingleys, having no desire to formulate any of their own, ran away to fetch their siblings with all possible haste.


	5. Chapter 5

_..._

 _In which the Folly is gained at some peril. The goodwill of the company is tested by the weather. Isabella quarrels with Henry Bingley._

 _..._

The ascent to the Folly was extremely rough, perhaps more so than even the dauntless Miss Darcy quite liked.

For all her sensible theories on velocity versus terrain, the carriage carrying the female contingent threatened to overturn itself at every irregularity in the stony path, of which there proved to be a wonderful abundance, even outnumbering its regularities. Despite this prompting many terrified squeals from the younger girls, and some gasps of real alarm from the elder, the carriage was guided and flanked by three excellent horsemen, being the elder Mr Bingley and his sons, and no actual harm was allowed to befall its burthen.

At last the Folly, which had been obscured from view by its very position atop the sheer hill, suddenly came into sight, at a much closer proximity than expected. Squeals of terror now became squeals of delight from the Miss Bingleys; Mary Earl spoke rapturously of its ornate detail, and even the placid Mrs Jane Bingley seemed enchanted with it. – All of which, put together, caused a most welcome sensation of swelling pride and triumph in Miss Darcy's breast, as the orchestrator of such wide-spread pleasure.

"You see: I knew it would be worth our while," she exclaimed exultantly. "My friend Miss Yarrow (whom, by the bye, you shall meet at the ball next week) assured me it was the pleasantest spot in all of Derbyshire."

Jane Bingley smiled. "Your friend might as well have said 'in all of Britain'," she replied, "– since Derbyshire is talked of as being the pleasantest county in the kingdom."

"Aye, by those who live there," laughed Miss Darcy. "We are all a little partial in favouring the beauties of our own neighbourhood."

"Truly, there is something wonderful to be discovered in every county, perhaps in every town," said Mary Earl earnestly. "And yet I do believe there is something about this district which distinguishes it from the gentler beauty of the south. It is altogether more spectacular. When I am in Kent, I find myself yearning for the ruggedness of the north."

With an arch smile, Isabella replied, "And do you dwell on the subject more when you are dancing with handsome counts, or when you are dining with great statesmen?"

"Nay, Isabella, this is not fair," protested Mary, with a pained expression and a blush. "You know my heart is here, in Derbyshire."

To this, Miss Darcy promptly acceded, for although she loved to tease, she never meant to wound, and the point of her jibe had landed too near its mark to do otherwise.

The carriage drew up near the Folly, and, as the five ladies had been installed very compactly together within, they gained their liberty with more of an appearance of enthusiasm than elegance. The subject of ancles was quite forgot by the Miss Bingleys, who rushed about very intrepidly: the bracing, fresh air stimulating them to behaviour very much out of parity with their aspirations to lady-likeness, but entirely natural to their youthful energy.

The Folly was examined, and praised, and pondered upon, and a few clever and profound things were said about it, and an equal number of obvious and mundane observations made. In the shelter of its very handsome portico, a flask was produced and some cups of tea were dispensed, and – though the wind got up, and clouds obscured the sun, and a light drizzle developed, and a rolling mist hindered the view – they made as pleasant a time of it, as might any group of people who really esteem each other's company, and are determined to enjoy themselves whatever the conditions.

At length the drizzle abated, and a ramble proposed, with a view to working up an appetite for their picnic luncheon.

The Bingley sons were each assigned a cousin and a sister to support; Lucas leading the way with Briony and Mary (who allowed the terrain to be manageable, after all), followed by Henry, with Rose and Isabella. Lastly, Mr Bingley and his lady wandered a little way behind, indulging in the usual eccentric practises of the older generation, in pausing frequently to examine specimens of flora, or to determine the origin of certain bird-songs, or even occasionally to stop altogether, and gaze at the horizon in comfortable, contented silence.

"Your parents lag behind us excessively," observed Miss Darcy to her cousin Henry. "Is it our conversation, think you, or our general demeanour, which unfits us for their company?"

Dryly, the young man replied, "I think you seek a mark of distinction, where none is deserved. The cause of their slowness may be traced, I do believe, to my father's gouty leg and my mother's stiff knees."

"Oh, how very ungallant of you!"

"That I deny you the distinction of being slighted by my parents? – Or that I call them decrepit?"

"Well – both."

"Really? Then we must each of us have very disparate an understanding of gallantry. I thought ladies generally disliked being slighted. "

"Aye, but equally do they dislike being thwarted in imagining themselves slighted."

Henry smiled. "You are falling into your usual habit of talking nonsense, I see."

"More ungallantness!"

"I will deign to be more gallant when you deign to be more sensible."

"Alas, that may never happen in either our lifetimes. – As to calling your parents decrepit: dreadful, dreadful accusation! There can be nothing more insupportable, more deplorable, than to be called that!"

"Pardon me, there is: I could do as you would – I could accuse them of being discourteous."

"I had much rather be accused of discourteousness than decrepitude."

Henry Bingley was silent. His cousin bestowed upon him a very impish glance, one of which she was quite adept, tending at once to exasperate and endear the beholder of it. "You make me no answer, sir," said she, at length.

"Madam, as you are not being serious, I shall not trouble myself."

At this, Miss Darcy addressed the young Miss Bingley, who had been staring wonderingly at her companions for some minutes. "Did you hear your brother, Rose? Do you not think him most uncivil?"

"Henry!" cried that young lady, "I wish you will be nice to Isabella!"

The gentleman turned surprised eyes to his young sister. "Am I not always nice? Is not it one of your chief complaints, that I am _too_ nice?"

"I meant agreeable."

"Ah, agreeable – I see. You wish I would agree with her oftener."

"No," said Rose gravely, "I wish you will behave – with chivalry."

Henry Bingley chuckled. "So I am to be neither gallant nor chivalrous! This bodes very ill for future success in commending myself to ladies."

"I don't want you to commend yourself to future ladies," retorted the young lady heatedly, for the stakes were, in her eyes, pretty high, "– only to Isabella."

Though the sentence was artlessly expressed, the two persons whom it concerned were each afflicted by a sudden suffusion of warm colour, chiefly in the region of their cheeks, which a great deal of hilarity could but poorly conceal. Neither one could quite pretend – at least, to themselves – that they had not given a little thought to what might signify their mutual delight in each other's company. That they liked each other very much was indubitable. But the infrequency of their meetings, coupled with particular doubts on each side, as to preference and position, had proved obstructive to bringing about an understanding.

Henry knew well that Miss Darcy looked with admiration on her cousin Arthur, as well as his elder brother Lucas; he knew that elder brothers were considered more eligible than younger ones, in the eyes of the world in general, but perhaps more crucially in the eyes of handsome heiresses. Isabella also knew it, but, to do her justice, she did not care one whit about it. Were she to choose a cousin to fall in love with, Henry would certainly be her choice, for Lucas Bingley was too sincere and literal in disposition to properly understand _hers_ , and Arthur Earl too sensible and sensitive to be satisfied with, or in turn to satisfy, her vivacious and somewhat capricious nature.

But, like other spirited, rich young women before her, Isabella had no inclination to hurry to a conclusion that which she vaguely thought of as her 'destiny'. That she might one day accidentally happen upon a gentleman in whom were combined the best qualities of all three of her cousins, was a consideration she was not readily willing to dismiss; – and even the youthful Miss Bingleys' romantic notions of a more exotic style of suitor, which concurred with her own at that same young age, could not be entirely abandoned and forgot.

Detestable concerns of economy and prudence, pitiable matters of desperation and insecurity, that compelled other ladies to safeguard themselves matrimonially against the evils of age and poverty, could hold no terrors for beautiful, young Miss Darcy of Pemberley. Well might she afford to bide her time, and indulge herself that which few, very few other women could: the leisure to 'wait and see'.


	6. Chapter 6

_..._

 _In which the picnic luncheon is demolished. The Turks are discussed, and Lady Catherine de Bourgh's motives questioned.  
Isabella is chided by her aunt Jane Bingley, and championed by her cousin Henry._

 _..._

The cliff-top ramble culminated, as rambles oft are wont, in a hasty dash back to shelter, when the earlier light drizzle – which had been spoken of as having definitely passed, and not at all likely to return – defied all their amateur powers of prophecy by revisiting them in the augmented aspect of a heavy downpour.

Gouty legs, stiff knees and delicate ancles were all disregarded in the face of a drenching, for 'though the gentlemen did not mind the mud as much as the ladies, nobody – male or female – liked their hat or bonnet made limp, or their hair to cling unbecomingly to their foreheads: both very real dangers, there being only three lacy parasols and not one sturdy umbrella to be had between all eight of them.

The Folly portico was quickly regained, and happy was the party's discovery that its favourable features had been graced, or even eclipsed, by the addition of a fine spread of cold luncheon, laid out with commendable alacrity by their two attendants at the earliest portent of returning rain.

"Here is a welcome sight!" declared Mr Lucas Bingley jovially, shaking the water from his hat. "I cannot ever recall a better-looking banquet."

"It is a pity the weather is not equal to every other component of our adventure," sighed Mrs Bingley.

"On the contrary, mother," replied the hearty young man, "I like a little dampness on a picnic: it improves one's appetite. I do believe, if given a choice in the matter, I would prefer it always to rain."

"Nay, this is too much, sir!" cried Isabella. "To prefer rain, just because it _does_ rain, is to plaster too thinly your good nature over a bad cause."

"I beg your pardon, Miss Darcy," he returned cheerfully. "I am quite sincere, I assure you."

"Aye, and if snowed, or shone, or blew a gale, you would be equally content and equally sincere."

After a thoughtful pause the young man replied, "– Perhaps you are right. I believe I _am_ content in any climate, provided I am surrounded by good friends."

Isabella laughed. "There! I have managed to extract a compliment for us all. Next time, you may spare the weather your praises, and heap them on us directly."

Lucas Bingley bowed and smiled congenially: he was well accustomed to his interlocutress' teasing and pithy manner, but his admiration of it was higher than his actual appreciation. Miss Darcy belonged, he felt, to that category of young ladies popularly referred to as "fascinating creatures" – for whom his awe outweighed his regard. To converse with her was never a straight-forward affair: her ideas tended to leap and turn in unexpected directions, and often he discovered, at the close of a lengthy discourse, that no definite conclusion had been reached, or point gained.

His younger brother observed the exchange with an habitually wry expression. Concealed deep within in his breast, something like pleasure, something like pain, and a whole spectrum of other imprecise sensations, accompanied his ruminations regarding his cousin Isabella Darcy. But he kept his feelings in this, as in many other things, to himself. Until he could with certainty understand that heart, belonging to the object of his own one, he would not expose himself to the injury that must attend on declaring an attachment that was perhaps neither reciprocated, nor desired.

"Now, now, children," said the elder Mr Bingley, eyeing the lamb cutlets speculatively, "let us have no more of your smart quarrelling. Dry or wet, we might as well enjoy our provisions."

Nobody being inclined to argue that proposal, they made themselves comfortable with various large cushions (placed with fastidious precision around the floor to give the elegant appearance of having been carelessly scattered thereabouts) and fell to doing their food the justice its enticing looks deserved.

"We are just like the Turks!" cried Rose Bingley enthusiastically. "Except they make their tea from mint leaves."

"Nay, Rosie," said Briony, "you must mean the Arabians: the Turks have coffee, I am sure, for Isolda Fairisle was always being given coffee after she was captured by pirates and taken to Constantine."

The subject was strongly disputed for a period lasting not longer than the demolition of a quail pie, after which it was dropped in favour of another, quite unrelated to tea or Turks, concerning one fictional 'Lord Zaruthoreia' – a shadowy individual hailing from some murky castle in the wilds of Bohemia – and the correct inflections to be given the many vowels comprising his extraordinary name.

Among the grown persons the conversation turned to Mary Earl's adventures in Kent, with a strong common interest in the habits and manners of the infamous Lady Catherine, who had so nearly transcended the bounds of reality, as to become something of a mythological figure, not much more substantial than the characters currently under discussion by the two Miss Bingleys.

"And did she really advise you never to wear blue?" asked Isabella, as the focus of the theme shifted from generalities to particulars.

"Yes, that is true," replied Mary.

"But – do you heed her advice?"

"I have so few items of that hue, it is no great inconvenience to do so."

Isabella gave a cry of incredulity. "I should take to wearing it every day, ere I endured such effrontery!"

"Nay, my dear," said Mrs Bingley, "I am sure Lady Catherine meant Mary no offence."

"Indeed, I am positive she did not," concurred Mary. "She only thought the colour not suitable to my complexion."

"Oh, certainly! A fair lady – with golden hair, and azure eyes, and with an excellent bloom – ought never to wear blue!"

Lucas Bingley remarked, "Perhaps she has a personal dislike of the colour."

"Perhaps," said his brother, "it goes ill with her furniture."

Isabella laughed. "Nay, I wager Mama sent Mary a blue bonnet or pelisse, and Lady Catherine has taken umbrage against it. – Am not I right, Mary? Did Mama send you something blue?"

Mary Earl looked perplexed. "She did. – But I think you wrong Lady Catherine by suspecting her thus. She has not a spiteful disposition, although perhaps she has an overly condescending one. To me, she is wholly attentive. I owe her much."

"That is right," said Jane Bingley seriously. Then, turning from one young lady to the other, she gently rebuked Isabella: "– And although you, my dear, may have no special reason to like her, nevertheless she is your near relation, and her age and rank are certainly due your respect."

Isabella so rarely experienced a chiding from her aunt, she could not but submit to it. Two vivid spots of colour appeared on her cheeks, very different to the rosy hue that had lately overspread them. She was, in her speech, as in her very nature, impulsive and hasty; and although her flippancy rarely transgressed the bounds of propriety, occasionally she misjudged her aim. She felt it was so now. Her opinion had been too hastily formed and expressed, and now it was as hastily regretted.

There was a now a brief pause in the conversation, the duration of which seemed very protracted and uncomfortable to Isabella; but her misery was foreshortened by Henry Bingley lightly remarking: "I think, mother, we have all become so used to hearing of the eccentricities of Lady Catherine, especially in regard to my Aunt Darcy's legendary encounters with her, that we cannot help but harbour some exaggerated ideas about her character. I for one, as a child, imagined her as something of an ogress: iron teeth and rolling eyes by no means omitted."

Lucas Bingley laughed delightedly at this. "Did you, Henry? Aye, – and so did I!"

His brother continued, "It sometimes astonishes me to recall that I have never met the lady, so deeply impressed are my earliest notions of her. Fortunately, we may now rely on Mary's authority to amend some of our more outdated prejudices."

Isabella silently honoured her cousin for reducing the sting of her error, by sharing it more generally about. With a full heart, she bestowed on the young man a smile so dazzlingly grateful and glad that he was obliged to turn away in some confusion, and continued quiet and aloof for the remainder of the afternoon.


	7. Chapter 7

_A/N **Thanks** to those who reviewed the first handful of chapters! I have taken your comments and critique on board, and hopefully have improved on a couple of points you raised (for instance, the reasoning behind Mary being sent to Rosings in Chapter 1.) It helps if you let me know if something isn't quite working because I don't have a beta to point out anomalies or mistakes. I truly appreciate your encouraging feedback! I hope you enjoy the next chapter xox_

* * *

 _In which Mr Arthur Earl arrives at Pemberley. Isabella pardons Henry of a grave crime.  
Miss Park and Miss Gourd discover a here-to-fore latent passion for Scotland, agriculture and country solitude._

…

At the week's end Pemberley welcomed back its honorary son, to the delight of all who loved and missed him. A year had passed ere the family had last assembled together, and if that year had wrought some noticeable changes on the young man, it was certainly not to his detriment.

"How tall and fine you are become, Arthur!" said Mary Earl to her brother, upon his alighting from his carriage on a brisk and bright afternoon. "Do not you agree, Isabella, that Arthur is grown very tall?"

"Most certainly," concurred Isabella, dancing merrily forward to greet him. "You will have to stoop, Arthur, if you wish to receive the tribute your dear cheek deserves." It being no hardship to do so, the young man readily complied.

"My dear sisters," he said (including Miss Darcy in this epithet), "how very well you both look. And here is quite a throng to welcome me home!" So saying, he was accosted with, and submitted to, a twelve-month's worth of salutations from all sides.

In truth, Arthur Earl had achieved his full height some several years earlier, but the many responsibilities as new master of a large and prosperous estate sate well upon his capable shoulders, adding year to year a certain stature to his air and general deportment. Indeed, adulthood very much suited his conscientious nature, though he sometimes resented the distance it installed between him and those he held dear.

His sister and cousin were not alone in noticing his improvements. Mr and Mrs Darcy marked it with the natural partiality of parental pride. Miss Daphne Park whispered to Miss Celia Gourd that she thought him grown quite debonair, and that lady confidentially replied that he seemed very mannerly indeed. The Bingley girls adjudged him handsome as a man could expect to be, who had not raven hair and a brooding countenance, and whose name did not begin with "Z".

When the company sat down to dine that evening, the conversation turned naturally to Dunwood, and the modifications being currently implemented by its young owner.

"I hope you have not removed the yew, Arthur," said Miss Darcy to her cousin. "A Scottish manor cannot be considered really complete without a thrawn old yew tree to loom over it and generally crowd out the sunlight."

"There is little enough of _that_ , yew or no," replied Arthur, "for it rains seven days out of six. However, your tree is safe from my interference. I have not much taste for tearing down what nature has let flourish for five hundred years."

"I am glad you will let it stand," said his sister. "Only think of the people – perhaps errant knights and wandering minstrels – who have passed beneath its sapling branches in days of old."

"I suppose they would number rather few, Mary, given how out-of-the-way Dunwood is."

"How dreadfully romantic Scotland is!" Miss Park suddenly interjected. "Although of course I have never seen it. But whenever I read 'The Lady of the Lake', I am sure it is the most romantic place in the world."

"For my part," intoned Miss Gourd solemnly, "'though I have never met a real one, I have always regarded Scotch persons as being very sensible and prudent – excepting, of course, such times as they contest the crown."

Said Mrs Darcy to her nieces, with a wonderful appearance of impassivity,"You must make a pilgrimage there one day, and determine the true extent of its romance and prudence for yourselves." Failing to detect the note of irony in her voice, the younger ladies agreed vigorously with their aunt, casting sundry meaningful glances in the direction of Mr Earl all the while.

"And what of your woods, Mr Earl?" enquired Henry Bingley. "Do you keep them, or make way for farmland?"

"The woods remain, although I have undertaken to clear some of the denser undergrowth. My chief handiwork lies in draining the marshes with a view to converting to grazing land."

"Nay, Henry," Isabella exclaimed, "I forbid you to interrogate Arthur on such tedious subjects as land reclamation! – At least, until we ladies are safely withdrawn."

"Forgive me Miss Darcy," said Henry wryly, "I forgot that for acceptable conversation, the fairer sex draws a distinction between improving a property's aesthetics and its utility."

Isabella's dark eyes sparkled with mischief, though her countenance was grave. "I pardon your crime, sir, though it be a grievous one," said she.

"I accept your pardon, madam, though it be a facetious one," returned the gentleman.

"Miss Darcy does not speak for _all_ of her sex, I assure you," said Miss Gourd, with a most compelling and chilling severity. "I, for one, find the subject of farming and drainage immensely interesting."

Miss Park quickly added, "Indeed, it is one of my favourite topics of all. – Not to participate in, for I'm sure I know nothing about it. But I own I have always loved to listen to the gentlemen talking about – about such things."

Miss Darcy was hard pressed to disguise her disgust. "I stand corrected and outnumbered, Mr Bingley," said she. "It appears we womenfolk are quite passionate about farm conversions, after all."

Happily for Isabella, (though not for her cousins Celia and Daphne) the subject was already being redirected by Mrs Jane Bingley in the following way: "And do you intend to 'winter' in Edinburgh this year, nephew?"

"No, Aunt, 'though I had much rather stay north, business compels me to come down to London."

"You might stop at Rosings!" exclaimed Mary happily, then, checking herself, "Of course, if my great-aunt is agreeable." (At this somewhat unfortunate choice of phrasing, the two Darcy ladies fastened each her gaze on her plate, and would not smile for the world.)

"And you must visit us on your way thither," said Jane.

"Aye, and he will come shooting with us," added the elder Mr Bingley jovially. "For we are rather indifferent hunters without an incomer to sharpen us up."

"I thank you, Aunt and Uncle."

At this piece of intelligence, Mrs Kitty Park, Mrs Mary Gourd, and their two daughters, all coincidentally decided that a late-autumnal visit to Hertfordshire would be a most propitious thing indeed.

"Do you generally prefer Edinburgh to London, sir?" Lucas Bingley asked Arthur Earl. "I always found it to be a gloomy sort of place, especially during the colder months."

"So it is," replied Arthur. "But as I am usually drawn there for business and not pleasure, the comparative dullness is something of a virtue."

Isabella shook her head at this. "Oh, Arthur, you are much too fain to be serious, now that you are out of my reach! I warn you, I intend to come to Dunwood and force you to give a ball every week until you learn the meaning of gayity."

"My dear Isabella, your efforts would all be in vain. There are not enough families in the area to properly populate a garden gazebo, let alone a ballroom – as you well know."

Isabella _did_ know it – and so left it to the Misses Park and Gourd to attest their extreme preference for country solitude and isolation  &c.

At length the ladies removed to the drawing room, and the gentlemen continued to comprehensively discuss and compare the developments of their respective estates. – And it was with much satisfaction that Mr Darcy observed with what unambiguous and sound sense his nephew undertook his role as master and improver of Dunwood Manor.


	8. Chapter 8

_..._

 _In which there is much activity, including a trial endured, a play acted and a meadow traversed.  
_ _The Earl siblings and Miss Darcy discuss their matrimonial propects._

 _..._

The passing of time became something of a Trial of Endurance for the two Bingley girls. The coming ball occupied their every waking thought, and a good deal of their sleeping thought also. They were to stay up 'til midnight! – and were to have ice cream! – and would wear new sashes! – And, moreover, they had extracted from their male relations (excepting their Uncle Darcy, whom they were too much in awe of to accost with a request of any kind) the promise of at least two dances apiece.

The older Misses were able to bear the interim days with tolerable equanimity. Miss Darcy, who had always been a little used to ruling over her cousins, devoted not only her own spare hours, but theirs as well, in fulfilling whatever adventurous whim possessed her each day.

Rambles were rambled, wild fruits were foraged, and – on one day which had the impertinence to torrentially rain – an exceedingly altered and abbreviated adaption of Love's Labour's Lost was enacted by the younger generation, for the amusement, if not actual benefit, of the elder.

The picnic, having been once a decided success, was recreated in humbler style on the Lambton green, beneath those spreading horse-chestnut trees so favoured by Mr Darcy in his boyhood. Afterwards the party wandered through a meadow of wild flowers, an activity which proved far more charming in theory than practice, the way being as equally strewn with thistles and briers as with bluebells and buttercups.

"If only Miss Yarrow were here!" sighed Miss Darcy, who was grouped with the Earls. "I should be completely content."

"I think you said she was coming to the dance?" said Mary Earl.

"Oh! Yes." With a somewhat guileful glance at Arthur, Isabella added, "I wish you knew her, indeed I do." Then, after a little pause: "Do you recall if ever I happened to mention her in my letters?"

Replied the gentleman, "If you mean your Lambton friend – the doctor's daughter? – certainly, you have spoken of her in your correspondence, frequently and with much praise."

"Have I? How very like you to remember everything I scribble down!... But she _is_ a sweet creature, to be sure. I feel positively you will like her, Arthur. – And Mary too, of course."

If Arthur Earl divined a little of the direction in which his cousin's thoughts ran on the subject, he betrayed it by neither look nor word. Mildly he replied, "I will be glad to meet any friend of yours, Isabella."

At this moment, Rose Bingley darted through their ranks, bearing a bouquet of wildflowers for each lady. "There are cornflowers and forget-me-nots for you, Mary, to match your eyes. And for Isabella, there is a bunch of pretty corn poppies, which look very well with your dark hair and brilliant complexion."

With ready and innate gallantry did Mr Earl swiftly stoop and gather a posy to courteously present back to the young lady, who received the tribute with a startled curtsy and a bashfully stammered word of thanks, and thereafter running away.

"Dear Arthur," said Isabella, who had observed the exchange with a fond smile, "I declare, you are wasted on the wilds of Scotland. Might not you exchange your seat for another, a little nearer civilization?"

"Do you mean, sell my father's estate?" He turned surprised eyes upon Isabella, his expression slightly pained. " _That_ I never would."

Miss Darcy blushed for having disturbed her cousin's habitually-placid countenance. "No, of course not, Arthur," she said quickly. "I only meant for you to infer that we who live beneath the border greatly miss you."

"Forgive me, Isabella," said the young man, as contrite for causing her blushes as she was for deserving them. "The subject is not an altogether painless one. To speak true, at present I bear my solitude very well... but I would not always wish it to be thus."

"I am certain it will not be." Then, casting a wry glance towards a bench upon which sate Miss Park and Miss Gourd together, she added, "Not with so many devoted cousins, anxious of your interests."

Arthur Earl was really too honourable a gentleman to joke at another person's expense, and so he merely smiled at his companion and made her no reply.

Said Miss Earl, "I am surprised you have not captured the heart of a beautiful Scotch lady, Arthur."

"Thank you Mary... but a loyal sister will always discover great virtues in her brother, where others perceive only commonplace attributes."

"Nay," said Mary, who really could be eloquent when defending those she loved, "rather, a sister has the advantage of being rightly able to distinguish between the two. No-one who knows you _truly_ , could ever mistake the matter."

"Here is a moral conundrum for you, Arthur," said Isabella with a merry laugh. "Your gallantry must submit to a lady's avowal, which your modesty would rather deny."

"Then allow me to avert it, by turning the topic back upon yourselves. I am heartily surprised you both remain unattached. You are grown into great beauties."

"I cannot speak for the Kentish gentlemen," Miss Darcy replied, "but the Derbyshire ones are not to be blamed for their timidity. I have been assured by two ladies who may be presumed experts on the subject (that is, the sage Miss Bingleys), that I am the orchestrator of my own undoing. Apparently the beaux are all affrighted by my bold and unladylike manner."

"And how do you defend yourself to your accusers?"

"Alas! I quite agree with them. It cannot be helped. My opinion will express itself, however resolved I am to contain it. ...Only yesterday I told Squire Trevethick that his hat was shamefully old-fashioned, and a stain on the reputation of all Northern gentlemen of fashion. – And so it was."

"You did not!"

"Never mind, Mary, the dear old man is stone deaf, so he liked me none-the-worse for it. Indeed, he pinched my cheek in a very shocking way and called me a "Saucy Puss." … I do believe the older generation are wholly more sportive and spirited than the younger."

"You may 'set your cap' at him, Isabella, if you like," said Arthur, "for he is a widower, if memory serves me right."

"Aye, I may yet have to, if the young gentlemen continue so fastidious."

The Earl siblings shared a smile at this, neither one feeling obliged to refute so improbable a scenario.


	9. Chapter 9

_..._

 _In which the arrival of a handsome man and his stylish sister is the leading subject at Pemberley's breakfast table._

 _..._

"Do not you think we had better invite Mr Sutton and his family to our ball?" – So enquired Miss Darcy of her parents as they sat to their breakfast, the morning before the great event was to occur. "They may feel neglected if we did not."

The group was small, comprising only the three Darcys and the two Bingley girls, for the morning was so diversely satisfactory to differing inclinations, that a third of their party had already gone out hunting, and the remaining third continued in their beds.

Replied Mr Darcy, "He is not two days arrived, my dear. It is unlikely he would wish to attend."

"But it were polite of us to extend the invitation to the family," Isabella pursued, with an air of such studied indifference as entirely betrayed her real interest in the matter. "One would hate to accidentally slight one's newest neighbours."

"You are grown wonderfully anxious of their feelings since yesterday," remarked Mrs Elizabeth Darcy archly to her daughter. "Pray, what has inspired this sudden neighbourly consideration in your breast?"

Her daughter could not help blushing a little. "I was only thinking of our being cordial."

"I know what has happened!" cried Miss Rose Bingley eagerly – and despite her cousin frowning at her, and making other peculiar faces expressive of dissuasion, it did not prevent the young lady from declaring: "There is a handsome gentleman arrived!"

"Is there, indeed?" said Mrs Darcy, affecting great surprise. "You cannot mean Mr Sutton, I'm sure, for he is a white-haired gentleman of at least five-and-sixty."

"Nay, it is Mr Sutton's grandson, who has _raven_ black hair; he is Mrs Ashby's son, and he is called Mr Acland Ashby, and he is _vastly_ handsome, and I think not above five and twenty."

Returned Isabella a little crossly, "Your information is very complete, Rose – although I know not what a little girl of eleven years has to do with any gentleman, raven-haired or otherwise."

"I cannot help knowing about him," said Rose with great dignity, for she objected to being called 'little', "– Lucas told me who he was."

"And me, also!" exclaimed Briony Bingley, "We discovered it all yesterday. Lucas and Henry had gone riding, and Rosie and I thought we might as well walk up the hill and see which direction they went –"

"Aye!" interjected her sister eagerly, "and we saw Mr Acland Ashby ride up to meet them near the downs –"

"– Although we didn't know his name then, –"

"– But, at least, we could see he was _vastly_ handsome, even from that distance, –"

"– So when he was gone away again, we rushed down the hill to ask my brothers about him, and Lucas told us that he belonged to the new rector's daughter –"

"– Who is a widowed lady –"

"– And that he was staying there for six weeks!"

Although this chronicle was not very eloquently delivered, its interesting essentials more than compensated its want of style.

"Well!" said Mrs Darcy, "And I suppose a gentleman's being handsome is as reasonable an excuse for us to be neighbourly, as any other one."

"True," replied Isabella, with some humour returned, "or, rather, it is the best excuse, Mama, where a ball is concerned. – However, since I've never laid eyes on the gentleman, I cannot vouch for his answering to our purpose. Unlike my cousins, who seem acquainted with everything ere it occurs, and everyone ere they appear, _I_ knew nothing of this mysterious Mr Ashley, or Mr Ashtree, or whatever his name is, until I heard his name mentioned this very morning."

"His name is Ashby," said Rose Bingley authoritatively, "And I assure you he is _vastly_ handsome."

"As this is the third time you've said it, I doubt not but that you believe so, Rose."

"I suppose we might send an invitation, my dear," said Mrs Darcy to her husband, "since there is the young lady, Miss Ashby, to think of also. She might appreciate our consideration."

"Certainly she would, if she is like other young ladies," replied Mr Darcy.

"I wonder if _Miss_ Ashby is handsome as her brother," Rose mused, "for I never did see her yet."

"That she may be pretty enough not to disgust the gentlemen," said Isabella wryly, "and plain enough not to displease the ladies, is the most we can _hope_ for. All else is down to the lady herself."

"I shall not be displeased if she is beautiful," said Rose. "I think a lady ought to be beautiful, if she can help it."

"I'm sure _all_ ladies would help it, if they could," Mrs Darcy replied to her niece. "But I'm afraid the matter is quite out of mortal hands."

If anyone had been tempted to dispute this remark, it was prevented by the gentlemen arriving from their morning sport, in that somewhat marauding fashion particular to hungry, energized males upon entering a passive domicile well furnished with divers and desirable comestibles.

The breakfast table became something of an impromptu buffet. Items that ought to have been carefully assembled on a plate and delicately sawn with silver were disdainfully manhandled and generally annihilated with little or no regard to propriety or custom; nor were any thoughts spared for the persons yet to make an appearance: all victuals were considered fair game by the sportsmen, and especially no quarter given to any dish containing pheasant.

After their appetites had been thus assuaged, the gentlemen were promptly accosted by the ladies, who wished in turn to serve their own, less easily satiated female appetites – i.e. for news and information &c.

In a promising quirk of fate, it transpired that the gentlemen had met the very persons so lately under discussion – the handsome Mr. and the mysterious Miss Ashby – taking the morning air, not one hour earlier.

But alas, in satisfying their ladies the men proved woefully unequal to the task, for – although all four of them agreed that Miss Ashby seemed like a stylish girl with a neat figure, and certainly not ill-favoured – not one of them could vouch for the shade of her hair, the tint of her eye, or whether she could be conscientiously called "dashing" – and of the several guesses hazarded as to her height there ranged quite a spectrum, encompassing, "very diminutive", "rather middling" and "taller than most."


	10. Chapter 10

...

In which Miss Darcy and Miss Earl call on the rectory.  
Mrs Ashby is by turns obliged, vexed, alarmed, tearful and obliged again.

...

With admirable alacrity did Miss Darcy volunteer to visit the rectory, undertaking to be the harbinger of happy tidings to Mr Sutton and his family by way of an invitation to the evening's ball. Whether or not the chance of meeting a "handsome, raven-haired gentleman" was a motivating factor in this act of charity may be left to others to decide – but it must be supposed it was not a repellent.

Isabella enrolled Mary to accompany her, and the pair set upon their quest as early as politeness dictated that curiosity must acquiesce to.

The walk was both pleasant and near – the rectory living being a mere quarter mile from Pemberley through a network of excellently kept lanes – and the weather proving obliging, the young ladies felt that to leave the carriage at home and venture thither on foot was a gamble well worth hazarding the state of their dress upon.

To any passing observer, Miss Earl and Miss Darcy made a pleasing addition to an environment already well-stocked with charms. Meandering paths and dappled bridleways were most prettily complemented by wispy muslin and bright faces, and the warbling birds' chorus lost no advantage for its being mingled with the echo of lively conversation.

At length the rectory was gained, and the ladies announced and admitted into its front parlour.

Although well-appointed in all other respects, the room was sadly deficient in black-haired gentlemen – indeed, no gentleman of any description was to be found, for Mr Sutton, it was soon discovered, had caught a cold during their recent relocation to Derbyshire, and was presently confined to his bed. Healing pottages and nourishing soups were quickly pledged on behalf of Pemberley's medicinal pantry, and all else that ought to be promised was promised handsomely, and all else that should be said, was said very prettily.

"Should you require a doctor," Miss Darcy advised Mrs Ashby, "you must send for Mr Yarrow in Lambton. He has the trust and patronage of all our neighbourhood."

"Oh, dear me! I am much obliged my dear; your interest is too kind," the lady replied, with an affable little laugh "– for it is always a bad business discovering a doctor whom one can tolerate. They are always so tall and grave. I was most vexed to leave behind our dear Dr Fenwick in Oxfordshire. He was an amazingly respectable man, and not at all towering."

Miss Darcy was at a loss to form a sensible answer, but Mary rescued her by murmuring, "That must have been hard on you, indeed, ma'am."

"Excessively hard, my dear: I declare I cry my eyes out whenever I think of our having moved so far from all we have known and loved. However, it is done, and this new situation is excessively comfortable. I do not think I shall miss Oxfordshire at all."

Only the sternest internal monologue could save Isabella's countenance from a breach of propriety. Presently she was composed enough to say, "I hope all your family will settle in easily. It is a pity your father has taken so ill."

"La, my dear, 'tis only a trifling sore throat and a mist in the head, the smallest head-mist imaginable. My father's constitution is generally very sound, you know, but he would insist on our travelling early. I begged him to delay until the dews had risen, but of course he would not listen to me. And now there he lies at death's door. However a few days will see him quite right."

"I do hope so, ma'am."

Mrs Ashby's appearance was all that might reasonably complement her girlish disposition. Though not younger than five-and-forty, the rosiness of her fair complexion and plump figure leant to her the impression of enduring youth; her artless, frivolous manner (not to mention her hair ribbons) compounded it almost unto juvenility. She had married very early, been widowed young, and – returning to live thereafter with her parents – she had continued in a capacity rather more in keeping with a giddy Miss Sutton than a matronly Mrs Ashby. Her two children she loved fondly but carelessly, and had not much more to do with them than to admire their pretty looks, as once she had admired her favourite dolls, and continue gratified as those exterior charms translated favourably into adulthood.

Mrs Ashby's daughter now sat opposite Miss Darcy and Miss Earl, quietly composed, betraying no outward blushes for the sake of her prattling mama. – Indeed, it seemed to Isabella that Miss Jemima Ashby must inherit her air and aspect entirely from her sire's lineage, for they could hardly prove a greater contrast to her mother's. Her beauty (for she _was_ beautiful) was of a decidedly continental style: cool in tone, exquisitely symmetrical, without blemish, though equally without bloom, giving an appearance of luminosity rather than brilliance.

Miss Darcy was too confident and comfortable in her own good looks to feel the pang of alarm which might have arisen in her breast had she been afflicted with a more jealous disposition. Happily, she was able to regard Miss Ashby with a purely critical eye, and acknowledge her to be very lovely, without her own equanimity being the least part degraded by her findings. With easy cordiality she now addressed her. "I hope you, Miss Ashby, escaped the perils so often associated with travelling."

"Thank you; I did," Miss Ashby replied. "I was a little fatigued yesterday, but am quite recovered."

"I'm glad to hear it," said Isabella. "My cousin," (indicating Mary) "often journeys between Derbyshire and Kent, and it is "ten to one" she will catch a cold every time."

"But I did not this time, Isabella," said Mary.

"Aye – this is the "one" of which I spoke.– You see how it is, Miss Ashby. Mary is always inconveniently disproving my theories whenever I am most wont to parade them."

Miss Darcy was used to her gently-sporting words eliciting at least a smile from her audience, however Miss Ashby merely bowed her head in acknowledgement and murmured, "Indeed."

It was not done coldly – Isabella could not be allowed to _quite_ feel piqued – but nor was she much endeared by such an indifferent response. She coloured a little, and was silent. There was now a general pause in the conversation, which at length ended with Mrs Ashby declaring, "Well, I am sure you are both too kind for calling on us so early. I had never expected to see you so soon."

Quickly collecting herself, Isabella replied, "I am sorry for our intrusion, ma'am – but I hope you will exonerate us when our purpose is properly explained." Here she stood and presented Mrs Ashby with a formal invitation to the evening's ball, which was received by that lady with a mixture of great excitement and greater alarm.

"A ball! – How exceedingly nice, how very kind! – But it is for tonight. Oh, dear me! I have not even unpacked my silks."

"We should perfectly understand if you are not able to attend, ma'am."

"Oh, that would be a great pity! – But I dare say Abigail will have them ready in time." She turned agonized eyes to her daughter. "Do not you think Abigail may have our silks ready, Jemima?"

"Yes, mama," replied her daughter. "I dare say she may."

This reassurance calmed Mrs Ashby for some several seconds, but soon she started up with sudden remembrance, and cried, "But we cannot leave my father alone! He may slip away at any moment."

Miss Darcy ventured to say, "I think you said that he only suffers a sore throat?"

"And a head-mist," said Mrs Ashby miserably.

Rather afeared that a tearful episode – or even a hysterical one – was imminent, Isabella hastily said, "I had something very like, this past winter: a sore throat, and a – a mist in my head. It turned out not to be in the least part dangerous."

"Did you?" The lady began to look hopeful once more. "And it wasn't dangerous, you say? – But, to be sure, a cold is generally not dangerous, unless it turns putrid. But I think it is the wrong time of year for that to happen." An inspiring new thought lit up her countenance. "Perhaps Abigail can tap on his door once each hour, just to make certain he has not slipped away in his sleep. What think you, Jemima?" Again she applied to her daughter to settle the matter. "Will it do?"

"I believe it will do very well, mama."

"How nice!" cried Mrs Ashby happily. "I am excessively fond of an elegant ball, and it would have been shocking to be prevented from attending. What luck that Acland is stopping here until we are settled. He will be our chaperone."

Isabella wondered a little at a widowed lady of forty-five requiring a chaperone to attend a neighbour's private ball, but she only smiled and said, "We shall be glad to see you all there, ma'am. My mother and father wish particularly to meet you."

"Do they? Dear me, I am most obliged, I assure you!"

The ladies then made their adieus, and were shown personally out by Mrs Ashby, with many "too kind"s on the one side, and a proportionate number of "not at all"s on the other.

And although Isabella spent a good deal of the walk home teasing Mary on the subject of the elusive Mr Acland Ashby, she could not for the life of her imagine what kind of gentleman he might really prove to be, with such contradictory indicants as his mother and sister afforded.

...

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 _A/N I know this fic will only appeal to a select few, but if you are one of them, then I very much hope you are enjoying it. I would love some feedback if you can find the time :) PS Next chapter will contain A BALL! Yay!_


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